Old Sith Empire
For over a thousand generations the Jedi Knights were the guardians of peace and justice in the Old Republic. Before the dark times. Before the Empire. This article is about a government or organization that is now defunct. =Old Sith Empire= Disambiguation of the Following The following information describes the Sith Empire under the rule of Rashael Koss, Lyra Onaesar and Seth DeSchaen from 14 ABY to 17 ABY, as well as its continuation in the Sith heartland (which is often colloquially referred to as the Sith Empire, just as often as the Sith Heartland, as Koss' Sith Empire, or as the Old Sith Empire) from 17 ABY on. It should not be considered authoritative regarding the Sith Empire as a whole after 17 ABY. Culture The Sith Empire is thoroughly an autocracy, with the Sith Order holding complete and utter control over the nation with no accountability whatsoever. They have engendered sensations of fierce nationalism and pride throughout their empire, essentially this means that even those who are not part of the order are proud to be members of the one true home of the Sith, a tradition of force users as old or almost as old as any other in the galaxy, and certainly the most powerful. Even those not in the Sith Order are born, live and die on Sith worlds, where their homes are but a few hundred miles away from the ruined palaces of Sith Lords of old. Those who do not experience this nationalism are, depending on the severity of their disapproval for the regime, either left largely alone to live their lives, or kept in check by the very real threat of Sith retribution - the Order rules with both the carrot and the stick, and is not reluctant to employ either as the situation warrants. Mundane governmental ministries - the office of the Prime Minister, the parliament of inner systems and council of governors for the outer systems, the Armed Forces command (divided into Naval Command, Army Command and Special Services), and others exist to run the day-to-day operations of the hegemony but all of these are subject to the will of the Sith Order. Indeed, the entirety of the Empire exists to aid the Sith, first and foremost. Should a child be born with Force sensitivity, a Sith acolyte will arrive (often without any warning, nor any explanation of how the Order is aware of the baby's sensitivity) and offer to take the child to be trained at the Sith Academy. The choice is left entirely up to the parents, but very few refuse this opportunity to elevate their child to this highest, most privileged class of society. The child is then taken at the age of 5 to become a Sith acolyte. Because the Sith Order is not opposed to such complications as Love - indeed, it encourages them - children are allowed to return and visit their families and loved ones, but only after their sixteenth year, and only then if they swear to keep the location of the Sith school an absolute secret, under pain of torture and death. The Sith themeselves cultivate practices of both hedonism (enhancing one's connection to the Force via the act of lovemaking is a common practice in the new order) and rigid discipline (training at the Acolyte stage is brutal and unforgiving, and is designed to traumatize the student so that she A) does not develop undue feelings of complacency because she is at the head of society without truly having to have worked for it and B) acquires negative passions such as anger and resentment that will fuel her connection to the Force). If the Sith are nobility, then the Sith Lords and the Dark Lord are royalty. In recent months, lavish palaces and public projects (Monuments, temples, obelisks, museums) have begun construction, in the name of the ruling class. To liken the Sith Empire to real world civilizations, it bears striking similarity to the ancient Egyptian Empire, ruled by its god-kings and dotted with monuments to the glory of its past, present and future. There is also an element of ancient Roman ambition, entitlement and mobilization. Sith Army The Sith Army is the primary infantry force of the Sith Empire. Responsible for maintaining garrisons and offensive units, the Sith Army is divided into the Sith Marines, Sith Defense Corps, and the Sith Guard. The Sith Guard is the primary infantry force, while the Sith Marines act as Special Forces units. The Sith Defense Corps serves as the primary garrison unit on all Sith planets. Even though the Sith Army is relatively small when compared to the armies of larger nations, each individual Sith soldier is trained and equipped to a much greater degree. As a result, the average soldier in the Sith Army is of veteran quality or better. Navy The Sith Empire owns the Sythic Shipyards and more secretly is in control of the Dorioss Shipbuilders. As such, its navy consists of vessels from both shipyards, listed as follows: * Sith Flagship, Maelstrom * Nession-class Cruisers * Apollyon-class Assault Carriers * Sith-class Star Destroyers * Vindicator-class Star Destroyers * Dirge-class Battlecruisers * Royal Flagcruisers * Rendili Stardrive Dreadnought-class Heavy Cruisers * Kuat Drive Yards Acclamator-class Assault Ships * CR90 Corellian Corvettes * DP20 Corellian Gunships * Kuat Drive Yards Venator-class Star Destroyer Mark Is * Kuat Drive Yards Venator-class Star Destroyer Mark IIs * Nebulon-B Frigates * Lancer-class Frigates In the wake of Norik Kun's death, many of the grand destroyers of the Sith Empire were lost or destroyed. The fledgling Sith Empire maintained an armada composed principally of two sources - advanced warships manufactured by the secretly Sith-owned Dorioss Shipbuilders, and military surplus from the Clone Wars that was cheaply acquired immediately after the Sith Order in its present incarnation claimed power. A recent militarization and aggressive push to retake all of its old assets has significantly bolstered the Sith war machine in recent months, however. At the time of this writing, the Sith Navy can field several hundred warships. They also have Ossian Bombers in their starfighter complement. The Sith Order The essential core of the Sith Empire is its order of Force users. This is the information regarding that aspect of the Empire. Origins Nassus was a world perpetually in twilight. The clouds were dense, filling the sky and diffusing the sunlight until by the time it reached the high, jarring peaks and deep valley forests of the surface, it was little more than a suggestion. The true day on Nassus took place at night, when the bioluminescent forests blazed a fierce blue, illuminating vast stretches better than the feeble sun ever did. Humans inhabited a number of cities in the mountainous regions. The world was a discomfiting place to live, with day feeling like night should and the luminescent sea-level forests and dark cloud cover giving the illusion that the sky was below and earth above. Over the centuries the human settlers learned to adapt and cope, but Nassus remained isolated after clerical errors deleted any mention of it from the old Republic’s registry. The planet remained unnoticed by the galaxy at large until the Jedi scholar Rashael Koss happened upon it in his research. He traveled there and found a world awash in the Force – all of its indigenous creatures were tremendously force sensitive. But it was the dark side that he felt there – the animals operated on instinct, they knew fear and hunger and lust and little else. Koss stayed on Nassus, studying the fauna, the people that had developed largely in isolation, the crystal formations that grew deep in the mountains and the trees that no human could go near without being blinded. While there he fell in love with a local woman and with her, conceived a child. The sensation of love defied all tenets of the Jedi Order – theirs was a detached way, that of objectivity and neutrality. Koss was an intelligent man and knew he had broken a central law of the Order in falling in love, but at the same time, could not come to understand how so beautiful a feeling could be anything but good. Unable to find resolution, his contemplations on the matter turned to dire rantings, which in turn transformed into an opposition to the sterility of the Jedi Code. Being a scholar, Koss had in his possession a number of artifacts he had excavated at archaeological dig sites on worlds that had once been a part of a Sith Empire some four thousand years prior. One of these was a holocron. He had never before so much as thought to activate it but now, bereft of answers and finding himself increasingly on confused, uncertain ground, he partook of the ancient Sith lore and discovered therein another philosophy, one that embraced the strength and vitality that accepting one’s humanity and emotion could bring. Koss found fulfillment in the things the holocron taught him, and came in time to condescend against and then hate the Jedi Order. He began to take apprentices from Nassus’ settlements, tempering all his teachings with a mantra – “Passion is power, but belligerence is weakness, and stupidity is death.” Rashael Koss and his students wandered across Nassus for years. They wandered northward, coming at length to miles-long tracts of twisting, dead forests and to jagged mountain ranges that scraped the dark, clouded sky. It was there that they discovered a vast, ancient edifice – rising up from a plateau, many miles long and extending so deep into the mountain that they could not begin to map out its extremities. The citadel, they fast discovered, had belonged to a Sith Lord of antiquity – one of terrifying prowess whose studies, throughout his centuries-long life, had been preserved in perpetuity in the cavernous, gothic libraries and laboratories in the deepest reaches of the mountain’s womb. Time had taken its toll on some of the Sith lore but much was undamaged and the new Sith took up residence in the castle, naming it Niflheim after a cold, frozen afterlife of legend. The Sith grew in their mastery by leaps and bounds, and under the tutelage and wisdom of Rashael Koss, grew to embrace passions other than bloodlust – they came to love each other fiercely, connect with such terrible potency that not a one could fathom bringing harm to any of the others. It was then that the Dark Lord Koss took on his final pupil, a young boy called Seth DeSchaen, whose father had brutally murdered his mother and then himself. Seth’s talent for the Force was unnerving to his teachers and peers – in the course of a year he had matched those who had traveled with Koss for half a decade or more. By his second year, he had surpassed them. When the Dark Lord of the Sith declared his two best students to be Sith Lords in their own right, Seth was one of them. The circumstances concerning the fracturing of the Sith fraternity of Niflheim are not entirely understood – what is known is that Seth DeSchaen murdered six of Rashael’s students, and drove another four insane, leaving their minds shattered and useless for the rest of their lives. Rashael Koss faced him and Seth defeated him but stayed his hand, opting not to kill his teacher. The order slowly recovered from the tragedy, and Seth DeSchaen, if he experienced remorse or punishment, gave evidence of neither. He retreated to Niflheim’s womb, to its deepest chambers that ancient spirits still haunted. He rarely came up, and spoke almost not at all when he did. And then one day, he called a meeting of the order and told them, “Norik Kun, Dark Lord of the Sith Empire, has died. Now is our time.” By clandestine effort, the Sith sowed the seeds of what would become their eventual conquest over the ancient throne worlds of Sith heritage. And then, one day, they struck – within half a year, the core worlds of the Sith Empire were united under a new order. Niflheim The palace of the Sith and their academy, Niflheim is a massive, gothic edifice built into a mountain on the hidden, Darkside-strong world of Nassus. It is more than two miles long and more than a kilometer into the sky, at places. Originally the stronghold of a Sith Lord of spectacular capability, Niflheim lay abandoned for thousands of years before Rashael Koss and his students took residence there. Even now, with the Sith Order growing, only a minute fraction of the castle is occupied. The Academy occupies one of the peripheral towers, looking out over a valley long since dried up, its once live forests now petrified, a weald graveyard. The classrooms, small library, dining hall, Acolyte dormitories, and the residence and training halls of the Marauders are in this tower. Even then, only half of the tower is occupied. Every acolyte is given his own room but it is a tiny cell, sparse and largely unfurnished save a cot, a desk, a meditation mat, and a light. Some cells are furnished by powered lighting, others require candlelight – not all of the lived-in areas of Niflheim have been refitted with power and running water – though these are mostly located in the Acolyte sector and Marauder’s quarters. The small library is overseen by a Sorcerer and two senior Acolytes – it features six hundred datadiscs concerning Sith Lore, three precious Sith holocrons, and four even more precious bound paper books so ancient that touching them is strictly forbidden – they must be handled through the Force with the utmost care and delicacy. There are also several thousand datadiscs concerning more mundane lore – history, theology, geography, the sciences, et cetera. The doors to the tower are massive, tons-heavy things, that can only be opened via an exquisite expression of the Force – Acolytes are generally not yet trained enough to force the doors open enough to allow entry or exit – thus locking them within their tower. Such heavy doors are the norm throughout Niflheim – almost every entryway is too large and heavy to move except with the Force. The architecture of Niflheim is very dramatic – it is all grand, echoing, buttressed halls, stained glass windows depicting images of tragedy and dark reference to the Sith Lords of yore, black stone and grey wood, vaulted ceilings, and pale blue light from glowing crystal statues in the grandest halls – the same indigenous crystal that, when used as a focus for a lightsaber, creates a blade of black-light negative blue hue. Below the Academy in the castle proper, are the dwells, reflection halls and training galleries of the Assassins, and the vast, private halls of Lyra Onaesar, Sith Lady and ruler of Niflheim. Only the area immediately surrounding the Academy tower is thus occupied – beyond the areas of habitation, the cold, cobwebbed wings and twisting corridors of Niflheim carry on for miles in silence. A vast, mostly empty hangar is built into the mountain directly beneath these apartments. A few squadrons of TIE-class starfighters, several shuttles and perhaps a Sith Battleship or two are typically docked here. Beneath the hangar begin Niflheim’s deep reaches – its dungeons and basements. These extend deep into the mountain upon which Niflheim is built, so much so that no one knows how far they go. They are empty and uninhabited for hundreds of meters and then, in the citadel’s deeper reaches – far, far below the rest of the Sith Order, the Sorcerers live and study. These perpetually dark halls are still haunted by ancient Sith spirits, and only the Sorcerers bear the disposition and raw talent with the Force not only to tolerate them – but to learn from them. The Sorcerers also keep in their sanctum the Great Library, far superior to its sibling in the Academy. This library houses thousands of texts both ancient and new concerning Sith and Darkside Arcana, and the Sorcerers are reputed to keep under strict guard the holocrons of several ancient and famed Sith Lords – as well, it is said, as holocrons created by the prodigal Sith Lord Seth DeSchaen and the Dark Lord himself, Rashael Koss. Below even the Sorcerers’ halls is the lair of Seth DeSchaen, where no one else treads. No one knows what secrets Seth keeps in those deepest reaches of Niflheim, or what if anything lies deeper still. Rashael Koss used to live in Niflheim, in the apartments now occupied by Lyra Onaesar. The Dark Lord presently resides on a private manor, thousands of miles to the south in a more populous region of Nassus. Branches of the Order The Acolytes Sith Acolytes are students, ranging in skill and talent from the newly initiated all the way to the almost-graduated. An Acolyte is typically born within the boundaries of the Sith Empire. There are generally two groups – the younger Acolytes, who are identified as being Force Sensitive when still no older than five years old and are raised in Niflheim until they graduate into full-fledged Sith at around eighteen years of age, and the older Acolytes, who for whatever reason were not identified as being Force Sensitive, and petitioned to be given Sith training. They usually graduate much later on – an Acolyte who began studying at Niflheim at age fifteen might, depending on her talents, become full Sith as late as thirty, or as early as a year or two after first arriving. Acolytes are taught basic Force manipulations and sensations, and philosophy – they do not enter into the actual masteries of Sith lore until near the very end of their education, and then it is only enough to gauge which path would be best for them to travel afterward – that of the Marauder, the Assassin, or the Sorcerer. The Marauders Fury incarnate, the Marauder is the warrior of the Sith Order. Stereotypes abound of Sith using their rage as a weapon, transforming themselves into mindless killing machines the likes of which the galaxy cannot comprehend – they lose themselves in the passions of battle and become more dangerous than a Jedi ever could. These stereotypes are realized in (and only in) the person of the Marauder, who unlike the other Sith, cultivates a unique psychology and paradigm within herself so that at any moment she may sunder her opponent violently and completely. The warriors of the Sith allow no quarter and sacrifice their own stability to become the most dangerous, thorough killers in Sith Space. The Marauders are taught only the most basic Sith disciplines – those necessary to enter into the characteristic bloodfrenzy that lends the Marauders their strength and invincibility in battle. In terms of mastery and aptitude, they are the weakest in the Order, and the lowest in the triarchy. The Assassins The Jedi call the hearts of the Sith dark. They call the powers the Sith draw upon the Darkside, and they say that the Sith work in shadows. For the assassins, this is true. The Sith Assassin studies the arcana of darkness and shadow, both concrete and intangible, both real and metaphorical. They move unseen and unnoticed – people forget they were ever there, they do not remember what they talked about or why things are different now than when before the Assassin came and went. They are the forgotten people, the invisible ones, and the Order stays hidden due to their efforts. The Sith Assassins are the middle rank in the triarchy, and are taught far more Sith magic than the Marauders, though only of a specialized variety – the magic of shadow is obscure and distinct from the rest of the Sith arts. The Sorcerers Masters of Niflheim, masters of the Empire, Masters of the Sith themselves, the Sorcerers are the most powerful, and the most introspective of the Sith Order. They study all the most secret, ancient and powerful Sith rites – only the Sorcerers are taught Sith Alchemy, only the Sorcerers are taught the most powerful spells and rituals, and the ways in which one may speak to the Force, and have the Force speak through them. The Sorcerers are the weakest in combative terms – they are ill-suited to direct fighting, but their mastery over their art means that they never have to – why duel a man, when you may drive him mad, plunge his heart into the depths of irrecoverable despair, make him think you are already dead – or – make him think he has already died? The Sorcerers spend their time in study and in philosophy – not the detached, objective studies of the Jedi, but the discordant, personal contemplations that unlock the true secrets of the Force. Where the Jedi think of themselves as the servants and defenders of the Force, the Sith Sorcerers see that they are the Force, an extension of its collective consciousness, their base animal instincts and their higher reasoning, their private selfishness and the greater need both given as expression of the countless small wills that comprise the one collective will that is the Force. Hierarchy of the Order Sith Acolyte > Sith Marauder/Assassin/Sorcerer > Sith Lord > Dark Lord of the Sith Current Sith Lords: Lyra Onaesar, Seth DeSchaen Dark Lord of the Sith: Rashael Koss